Actually Canada Day was yesterday (July 1). I barely left the house and didn’t put on makeup, and we were total hermit bums and completely avoided the fireworks and all possible forms of merrymaking. I helped my daughter sew shorts. It was heavenly. But that’s another story for another blog post, because today I’m talking about my Canada Day outfit. Which, as I said, I didn’t wear on Canada day, because that would’ve required changing out of my PJs. I wore it to work today, though, styled as above, though I don’t think that much of my belly was showing. I got plenty of compliments, anyway, even from the Mennonite ladies, so it can’t have been too scandalous.
I won’t exactly say this outfit feels “me” but it was pretty fun to make. The fabric is a quilting cotton, lined with white muslin, so basically heaven to sew. The pattern, of course, is Gertie’s Butterick 6354.
I was originally envisioning some kind of simple strappy sundress for this fabric, but when B6354 came out, my plans changed pretty quickly. This would’ve been the perfect outfit for spending a day at the celebrations in the park, eating cake and watching multicultural dancing and topping it off with fireworks. If only I weren’t such a lazy bum.
Anyway, the skirt was super simple and fun to sew. And it has a pretty cool shape, though maybe it’s a bit long on me.
The bodice was a bit more complicated but still not technically bad. I’d never done centre darts before—it was interesting to try but I don’t love them. And I feel like I should’ve shortened my bias front flap pieces a little as they stick out kinda funny. Oh, and did I mention how small I feel like my boobs are in this?
An SBA might have been a good idea. As it was, by the time I could really try it on it was fully assembled, so I wound up taking a couple of tucks out of the back to bring the whole thing in. Much better, for a last-minute on the fly fix. So if you’re minimal-boobed, like me, you might want to size down. Or add in padded cups. That would’ve been fun. 🙂
The back view.
And that’s about all I can remember, since of course I made this over a month ago so it could hang for a shop project. Happy Canada day, to my fellow Canadians—and happy Indpendence Day to anyone reading from the States. And if you have some other national holiday to be happy about, well, that’s awesome too. And if not, well, have cake anyway!
“Did you see the November mailer?” my manager asked when I got to work one day last fall. Of course not—it had just arrived a day or two ago at the store, and usually only the managers see them much ahead of time. “There’s a project you need to do.”
Anyway, with the gauntlet thrown down, the angst set in. Project budgets are limited and coating fabric is expensive. I wandered the aisles of coating, wistfully petting the meltons and boiled wools while I calculated the price of 3.7m of the fabric and came up, again and again, on the sad fact that even the cheapest polyester-acrylic coating, with nary a hint of wool, was beyond my project budget. Suiting fabric it was.
Once I had pattern and fabric at home, of course, I had to confront one very particular fact: this very fun coat pattern is, first and foremost, a McCall`s coat pattern. AÂ McCall`s coat pattern is basically a dress pattern with extra ease. This didn`t bother me so much when I made 
Fortunately, the power of the Internet was with me. Sherry`s 
Fitting changes:
Changes to make to the pattern:
Tailoring:
All of that tailoring and it was still pretty minimal. The jacket is soft and floppy. The sleeves are the worst, although rolled up and scrunchy they are ok.
I did like how the shoulder pads turned out—I layered a bit of cotton batting with knit interfacing top and bottom, and fused them together, then shaped with steam and let cool.
I added sleeve heads, too.
It’s still an AWFUL lot of ruffles, though.
 Not much to say here.
Unlike other shirt patterns I’ve sewed with, this KS one had only 1/4″ seam allowances. Throughout. Now, I’m a fan of narrow seam allowances generally, and I got excited for a bit because the 1/4″ SA would actually work with my flat fell foot! BUT, on a soft flannel it was really easy to miss the seam allowance if there was a miscut (and I am not the world’s best cutter) or for the seam to ravel on handling before I could get it finished. I’d like to try it again on a finer shirting. With felled seams. (They felt too firm for the soft flannel feeling I was going for.) I wound up having to darn part of the back yoke where I had missed the seam allowance. Bad seamstress.
I cut & sewed it when I had a few days off after Easter, then realized that none of the buttons I had enough of were suitable* and had to hold off for a little while, at which point I had lost all drive (plus he was already wearing it—it’s not like it’s destined for office wear.)
Eventually, though, I managed to get some plain black buttons and see them on, and it’s been in pretty common rotation since. And I even managed to cut another Burda 6849Â out of the remainder for Tyo, assuming I can motivate myself to actually sew it up.
And that’s about it, really. Oh, the front knotted look is as per the husband’s style instructions, and the high-rise-ass-hanging-out-shorts were acquired by one of my children from a friend. My husband forbid them to wear the shorts out of the house, so I have stolen them. I haven’t worn anything with this high a rise since I figured out I could cut the waistband off my Levi’s 501s in about 1998. It feels profoundly weird.
No sooner do I declare that I like a bit of edge in my clothing, than I make a bunch of things that are super sweet.
A couple of construction notes: the pattern calls for self-lined shoulder pieces and cap sleeves. I substituted a navy stretch poplin for these pieces (as well as the pocket lining) because of my heavier fabric. I also went a bit off road on the construction, as I wasn’t completely fond of the method described. I am pretty happy with what all I did, even the moment when I had the entire bodice rolled up inside the little front “placket” so I could machine finish it. Just not with the fit. /sigh.
I’m not sure if this is the wisest style decision I’ve ever made, but I do like the flatness of it. It goes with the denim but seems a bit out of place with the lace. And the fancy pull is gigantic. Oh, well.
It does look a bit like a Victorian bathing suit.
My 
Anyway, this completion happily coincided with a couple of things. With my most recent 
We bounced around the house, playing with the light.
Every room was different.
I may have had a bit too much fun with the editing process, making sepia and low-colour versions. Oh, well. They’re my photos and I’ll cheese ’em up if I want too. I also lost the cover off one of my fabric-covered buttons while getting dressed, so that had to be photoshopped out of a bunch of pics. I will warn you, I also took the liberty of some SERIOUS Photoshopping once or twice—so if you catch yourself wondering “is her waist really that small?” The answer is probably “no, not even in a corset.” PICTURES LIE!!!!
*you’ve seen my hair, right? Short of concocting a story about how I cut it off and sold it to buy a chain for my husband’s prize watch, which he sold to buy me a comb for my beautiful hair, we’re kinda stuck. I don’t have an appropriate wig, and I’m disinclined to go out and buy one at the moment. I also don’t have a period hat for the outdoor shots.
So a little while ago, I fell in love with a fabric at work. Because that doesn’t happen like every two seconds. This was a sweet rayon with a print that felt very vintage, in a soft green that is not at all my usual palette. And then we got this adorable embroidered net lace, and the pairing raised the delicate sweetness to soaring heights. Completely in love. But a little worried about making something from it that I actually want to wear. I generally like a wee bit of an edge to my sweetness, and lately I’ve been feeling that a bit more keenly. This rayon seemed like it wanted to be a drapey 30s or 40s style dress, which are sweet but not really edgy. 
Tanit-Isis Sews 